Messerschmitt Me 328
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The Messerschmitt Me 328 was originally designed as a
parasite aircraft A parasite aircraft is a component of a composite aircraft which is carried aloft and air launched by a larger carrier aircraft or mother ship to support the primary mission of the carrier. The carrier craft may or may not be able to later recov ...
to protect ''
Luftwaffe The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...
''
bomber A bomber is a military combat aircraft designed to attack ground and naval targets by dropping air-to-ground weaponry (such as bombs), launching aerial torpedo, torpedoes, or deploying air-launched cruise missiles. The first use of bombs dropped ...
formations during
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. During its protracted development, a wide variety of other roles were suggested for it. Late in the war, the design was resurrected for consideration as a ''
Selbstopfer The ''Leonidas'' Squadron, formally known as ''5th Staffel of Kampfgeschwader 200'', was a unit which was originally formed to fly the '' Fieseler Fi 103R (Reichenberg)'', a manned version of the V-1 flying bomb, in attacks in which the pilot was ...
'' (
suicide weapon A suicide weapon is a weapon designed to be used in a suicide attack, typically based on explosives. History Suicide weapons have been used both in conventional warfare, as well as in terrorism. In the Second Sino-Japanese War, Chinese used ...
) aircraft, but was judged unsuitable even for this purpose. The tiny fighter was to have been propelled by
pulsejet 300px, Diagram of a pulsejet A pulsejet engine (or pulse jet) is a type of jet engine in which combustion occurs in pulses. A pulsejet engine can be made with few or no moving parts, and is capable of running statically (i.e. it does not need ...
s, but the unsuitability of these engines doomed the Me 328 from the start.


History


Design

The aircraft was designed as Messerschmitt project P.1073 in 1941, and was originally conceived as a cheap and simple escort fighter, to either be towed aloft by a
Heinkel He 177 The Heinkel He 177 ''Greif'' (Griffin) was a long-range heavy bomber flown by the ''Luftwaffe'' during World War II. The introduction of the He 177 to combat operations was significantly delayed, by both problems with the development of its ...
heavy bomber Heavy bombers are bomber aircraft capable of delivering the largest payload of air-to-ground weaponry (usually bombs) and longest range (takeoff to landing) of their era. Archetypal heavy bombers have therefore usually been among the larges ...
or
Junkers Ju 388 The Junkers Ju 388 '' Störtebeker'' is a World War II German ''Luftwaffe'' multi-role aircraft based on the Ju 88 airframe by way of the Ju 188. It differed from its predecessors in being intended for high altitude operation, with design feature ...
using a semi-rigid bar (the ''Deichselschlepp'', which was also considered for towing winged auxiliary
fuel tank A fuel tank (also called a petrol tank or gas tank) is a safe container for flammable fluids. Though any storage tank for fuel may be so called, the term is typically applied to part of an engine system in which the fuel is stored and propel ...
s), or carried on a Me 264 in a ''
Mistel ''Mistel'' (German for "mistletoe", a parasitic plant) was the larger, unmanned component of a composite aircraft configuration developed in Germany during the later stages of World War II. The composite comprised a small piloted control aircr ...
'' type fashion. Three versions were proposed: an unpowered
glider Glider may refer to: Aircraft and transport Aircraft * Glider (aircraft), heavier-than-air aircraft primarily intended for unpowered flight ** Glider (sailplane), a rigid-winged glider aircraft with an undercarriage, used in the sport of glidin ...
, a version powered by Argus pulsejets, and a version powered by a
Jumo 004 The Junkers Jumo 004 was the world's first production turbojet engine in operational use, and the first successful axial compressor turbojet engine. Some 8,000 units were manufactured by Junkers in Germany late in World War II, powering the Mess ...
turbojet The turbojet is an airbreathing jet engine which is typically used in aircraft. It consists of a gas turbine with a propelling nozzle. The gas turbine has an air inlet which includes inlet guide vanes, a compressor, a combustion chamber, and ...
.Wood & Ford, pp. 41-42 Its construction was to be mainly of wood. It was subsequently handed over to the ''
Deutsche Forschungsanstalt für Segelflug The ''Deutsche Forschungsanstalt für Segelflug'' (), or DFS , was formed in 1933 to centralise all gliding activity in Germany, under the directorship of Professor Walter Georgii. It was formed by the nationalisation of the Rhön-Rossitten Ge ...
'' (DFS - "German Research Institute for Sailplane Flight") for development. Two versions were proposed, the Me 328A (fighter) and the Me 328B (bomber); it was estimated that four Me 328s could be built for the cost of a
Focke-Wulf Fw 190 The Focke-Wulf Fw 190, nicknamed ''Würger'' (" Shrike") is a German single-seat, single-engine fighter aircraft designed by Kurt Tank at Focke-Wulf in the late 1930s and widely used during World War II. Along with its well-known counterpart, ...
or
Bf 109 The Messerschmitt Bf 109 is a German World War II fighter aircraft that was, along with the Focke-Wulf Fw 190, the backbone of the Luftwaffe's fighter force. The Bf 109 first saw operational service in 1937 during the Spanish Civil War an ...
fighter. It was also suggested at one point that it be towed behind the Me 264 heavy bomber for protection. One of the main problems that the project faced was with engines - the pulse jets didn't operate well at high to medium altitudes (where most combat would take place) due to the lower air pressure. The engines also generated a huge amount of noise which could be heard miles away, making them unsuitable. The excessive vibration of the engine would be compounded by the fact that in a twin-engined craft the two pulsejets would be producing oscillations in their own unique thrust cycle, which would cause instability due to
asymmetry Asymmetry is the absence of, or a violation of, symmetry (the property of an object being invariant to a transformation, such as reflection). Symmetry is an important property of both physical and abstract systems and it may be displayed in pre ...
as well as
resonance Resonance describes the phenomenon of increased amplitude that occurs when the frequency of an applied periodic force (or a Fourier component of it) is equal or close to a natural frequency of the system on which it acts. When an oscillatin ...
.


Prototypes

Test pilot
Hanna Reitsch Hanna Reitsch (29 March 1912 – 24 August 1979) was a German aviator and test pilot. Along with Melitta von Stauffenberg, she flight tested many of Germany's new aircraft during World War II and received many honors. Reitsch was amon ...
carried out a test programme on the two
prototype A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics, design, electronics, and Software prototyping, software programming. A prototyp ...
s of the glider version, releasing from its carrier aircraft at altitudes of . Ground launches, using both cable-type
catapult A catapult is a ballistic device used to launch a projectile a great distance without the aid of gunpowder or other propellants – particularly various types of ancient and medieval siege engines. A catapult uses the sudden release of stored p ...
s and rocket-assisted carriages on rails were also successful. Even with a reduced
wingspan The wingspan (or just span) of a bird or an airplane is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777–200 has a wingspan of , and a wandering albatross (''Diomedea exulans'') caught in 1965 had a wingspan of ...
the aircraft had a very satisfactory performance, and it was planned to build up to 1,000 for use as disposable bombers to be flown by volunteers from 5/KG200, the so-called
Leonidas Squadron The ''Leonidas'' Squadron, formally known as ''5th Staffel of Kampfgeschwader 200'', was a unit which was originally formed to fly the ''Fieseler Fi 103R (Reichenberg)'', a manned version of the V-1 flying bomb, in attacks in which the pilot was ...
. Seven prototypes powered by two
Argus As 014 The Argus As 014 (designated 109-014 by the RLM) was a pulsejet engine used on the German V-1 flying bomb of World War II, and the first model of pulsejet engine placed in mass production. License manufacture of the As 014 was carried out in Ja ...
pulsejets, as used on the
V-1 flying bomb The V-1 flying bomb (german: Vergeltungswaffe 1 "Vengeance Weapon 1") was an early cruise missile. Its official Ministry of Aviation (Nazi Germany), Reich Aviation Ministry () designation was Fi 103. It was also known to the Allies as the buz ...
were built by glider manufacturer, Jacobs-Schweyer of
Darmstadt Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it th ...
. It was intended for use as a fighter aircraft, to be armed with two 20 mm
MG 151/20 cannon The MG 151 (MG 151/15) was a German 15 mm aircraft-mounted autocannon produced by Waffenfabrik Mauser during World War II. Its 20mm variant, the 20 mm MG 151/20 cannon, was widely used on German Luftwaffe fighters, night fighters, figh ...
s. However, during static testing it soon became apparent that the same problems which were to plague the early development of the V-1 flying bomb - namely, excessive vibration - would make the project difficult to bring to a successful conclusion, and the manned flight programme was suspended in mid-1944, after only a few test flights had been made. Some sources say two prototypes were destroyed by inflight structural failure caused by vibration. Despite this, planning continued, and a version was projected, which would use four Argus pulsejets, two mounted below the wings in addition to the original pair mounted above the rear
fuselage The fuselage (; from the French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an engine as well, although in some amphibious aircraft t ...
. Bomber versions of both types were proposed, and work continued on them at the insistence of
Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
long after the point when anything other than token use could have been made of them. Moves were made to revive the Me 328 again in 1944 as a piloted flying bomb based on the Me 328B, fitted with a bomb, but it was dropped in favour of the
Fieseler Fi 103R (Reichenberg) The Fieseler Fi 103R, code-named ''Reichenberg'', was German manned version of the V-1 flying bomb (more correctly known as the ''Fieseler Fi 103''). It was developed towards the end of the Second World War and, although it never entered service ...
. Two differing revised versions - one designated as the Me 328C, to be fitted with a Jumo 004 turbojet — and another, in-house proposal that did not receive a letter suffix, used two As 014 pulsejets mounted on pylons mounted onto the rear fuselage sides — refitted with a
twin tail A twin tail is a specific type of vertical stabilizer arrangement found on the empennage of some aircraft. Two vertical stabilizers—often smaller on their own than a single conventional tail would be—are mounted at the outside of the aircra ...
empennage design — along with a Porsche 109-005 single-use turbojet of thrust in the same dorsal rear location as meant for its use on the V-1, allowed with the new twin-tail design — but neither of these proposals came to anything. Owing to the basic idea of short-life reaction propulsion units to power it, the Me 328 project is often listed as a
suicide weapon A suicide weapon is a weapon designed to be used in a suicide attack, typically based on explosives. History Suicide weapons have been used both in conventional warfare, as well as in terrorism. In the Second Sino-Japanese War, Chinese used ...
, however the aircraft was not intended as such.


Proposed roles

A wide variety of roles were suggested for the aircraft, ranging from a
point-defence Point defence (or point defense; see spelling differences) is the defence of a single object or a limited area, e.g. a ship, building or an airfield, now usually against air attacks and guided missiles. Point defence weapons have a smaller range in ...
interceptor Interceptor may refer to: Vehicles * Interceptor aircraft (or simply "interceptor"), a type of point defense fighter aircraft designed specifically to intercept and destroy enemy aircraft * Ford Crown Victoria Police Interceptor, a police car * ...
, to a version with
folding wing A folding wing is a wing configuration design feature of aircraft to save space and is typical of carrier-based aircraft that operate from the limited deck space of aircraft carriers. The folding allows the aircraft to occupy less space in a c ...
s and twin pulsejets to be launched from a catapult on a
U-boat U-boats were naval submarines operated by Germany, particularly in the First and Second World Wars. Although at times they were efficient fleet weapons against enemy naval warships, they were most effectively used in an economic warfare role ...
, to a
ground-attack aircraft An attack aircraft, strike aircraft, or attack bomber is a tactical military aircraft that has a primary role of carrying out airstrikes with greater precision than bombers, and is prepared to encounter strong low-level air defenses while pres ...
. Various modifications to the prototypes were made to evaluate their suitability for these missions, and different engine configurations were tested. Despite all this, the vibration problem simply could not be overcome and the program was abandoned in early 1944, even as production facilities were being readied to construct the aircraft at the Jacobs Schweyer sailplane factory in Darmstadt. According to Thomas Powers's book '' Heisenberg's War'' the idea of using the Me 328 as a
parasite Parasitism is a close relationship between species, where one organism, the parasite, lives on or inside another organism, the host, causing it some harm, and is adapted structurally to this way of life. The entomologist E. O. Wilson has ...
bomber within the
Amerika Bomber The ''Amerikabomber'' () project was an initiative of the German Ministry of Aviation (''Reichsluftfahrtministerium'') to obtain a long-range strategic bomber for the ''Luftwaffe'' that would be capable of striking the United States (specifical ...
program was explored. It was to be carried by or towed behind either an Me 264 or a Ju 390 to attack
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. Plans for this tactic — first proposed as much as nine months before Heinkel's trans-Atlantic ''Amerika Bomber'' design competitor received its own RLM designation — were hatched from a meeting between ''Generalfeldmarschall''
Erhard Milch Erhard Milch (30 March 1892 – 25 January 1972) was a German general field marshal (''Generalfeldmarschall'') of Jewish heritage who oversaw the development of the German air force (''Luftwaffe'') as part of the re-armament of Nazi Germany foll ...
and ''Generalmajor''
Eccard Freiherr von Gablenz __NOTOC__ Eccard Freiherr von Gablenz (26 January 1891 – 17 December 1978) was a German general in the Wehrmacht during World War II who commanded several divisions. He participated in the campaigns of Poland, France and the invasion of the Sovi ...
at Berlin on 12 May 1942. After release, the Me 328 pilot would release a bomb over
Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
and then ditch at sea near a U-boat. The idea was dropped in August 1942.


Variants

;Me 328 glider: Two prototype glider aircraft built by Jacobs-Schweyer Flugzeugbau G.m.b.H. (Hans Jacob). Carried piggy-back on a
Dornier Do 217 The Dornier Do 217 was a bomber used by the German ''Luftwaffe'' during World War II as a more powerful development of the Dornier Do 17, known as the ''Fliegender Bleistift'' (German: "flying pencil"). Designed in 1937 and 1938 as a heavy bomber ...
and released for flight test, at times by
Hanna Reitsch Hanna Reitsch (29 March 1912 – 24 August 1979) was a German aviator and test pilot. Along with Melitta von Stauffenberg, she flight tested many of Germany's new aircraft during World War II and received many honors. Reitsch was amon ...
. :Me 328 V1 to V7:Seven pre-production prototypes of the Me 328B, also built by Jacobs-Schweyer, powered by Argus AS 014 pulse-jet engines. ;Me 328A:The proposed parasite fighter intended for carriage by the ''
Amerika Bomber The ''Amerikabomber'' () project was an initiative of the German Ministry of Aviation (''Reichsluftfahrtministerium'') to obtain a long-range strategic bomber for the ''Luftwaffe'' that would be capable of striking the United States (specifical ...
'', ;Me 328B:The proposed bomber variant. ;Me 328C:
Jumo 004 The Junkers Jumo 004 was the world's first production turbojet engine in operational use, and the first successful axial compressor turbojet engine. Some 8,000 units were manufactured by Junkers in Germany late in World War II, powering the Mess ...
powered fighter derivative proposed in 1944.


Specifications (Me 328B)


Replica

One replica is on display at the
Military Aviation Museum The Military Aviation Museum in Virginia Beach, Virginia, is home to one of the world's largest collections of warbirds in flying condition. It includes examples from Germany, France, Italy, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, from ...
in
Virginia Beach, Virginia Virginia Beach is an independent city located on the southeastern coast of the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. The population was 459,470 at the 2020 census. Although mostly suburban in character, it is the most populous city ...
.


See also

*
Emergency Fighter Program The Emergency Fighter Program () was the program that resulted from a decision taken on July 3, 1944 by the Luftwaffe regarding the German aircraft manufacturing companies during the last year of the Third Reich. This project was one of the ...
*
Blohm & Voss P 213 The Blohm & Voss P 213 was a submission to the ''Miniaturjäger'' (Miniature Fighter) programme of the ''Luftwaffe'' Emergency Fighter Program towards the end of the Second World War. The ''Miniaturjäger'' was to be powered by a pulse jet but th ...
* Messerschmitt P.1079 *
Junkers EF 126 The Junkers EF 126 was an experimental fighter proposed by the German of 1944–1945, for a cheap and simple fighter powered by a pulsejet engine. No examples were built during the war, but the Soviet Union completed both unpowered and powered p ...


Notes


References

* * *


External links


Warbirds Resource GroupMesserschmitt Me-328 V1 PM ModelsMesserschmitt Me 328
{{RLM aircraft designations Abandoned military aircraft projects of Germany 1940s German fighter aircraft
Me 328 The Messerschmitt Me 328 was originally designed as a parasite aircraft to protect ''Luftwaffe'' bomber formations during World War II. During its protracted development, a wide variety of other roles were suggested for it. Late in the war, the d ...
Parasite aircraft Pulsejet-powered aircraft World War II jet aircraft of Germany Twinjets Low-wing aircraft